LONG BEACH – A Long Beach father of three was in jail Tuesday night for allegedly dealing meth out of a Women, Infants and Children program store.

Long Beach Police Department undercover narcotics investigators began tracking Benjamin Enrique Vega about four weeks ago and watched as he allegedly made numerous drug sales alongside the baby formula, diapers, milk and eggs that stock his small store located across from St. Mary Medical Center, authorities said.

“Operating at a such a high-profile location, you’re not going to be in business for long,” said Sgt. Paul LeBaron.

One of them, who asked for $20 worth while talking to a detective who posed as Vega on the phone, was arrested on suspicion of attempting to buy drugs after she showed up with the cash in her pocket and the date and time of her phone call to Vega stamped in her cell phone and his phone, both of which were seized for evidence.

She stammered when asked what she was doing in the shop, first saying she came in to buy a drink – she could not tell police what kind of drinks were sold in the business – and then claiming she was meeting Vega or another employee for a date.

Slurring her words and shuffling her feet, she told the officers she did not use meth but had just taken a Vicodin – purchased without a prescription – before arriving at the shop.

When police first swarmed into the location at about 6 p.m., an elderly resident walked up, asking one officer what was going on.

After he explained about the bust and asked her if she had noticed anything odd about the store, she told the officer she saw a lot of things going on there.

“You should just shoot them,” the neighbor said in Spanish.

In addition to searching the store, officers also searched Vega’s van and his home, located one block east of the shop, but found no drugs.

The search took more than two hours as officers methodically pawed through the store and and its three stock rooms, which stretched behind the small shop, where customers can buy canned food, milk, eggs, bread, cereal, candy and small gift items.

The thick layer of dust that blanketed the stock and the rapid succession of calls from customers looking for drugs seemed to show that the store was more of a front for drug dealing than a legitimate business, LeBaron said.

Some of the merchandise – including an original Battleship board game and a “stereo receiver,” the apparent precursor to the Walkman, which looked like it dated from the late 1970s to early 1980s – appeared better suited for an antique shop than a WIC grocery store designed to sell food to low-income families.

The 42-year-old suspected drug dealer and his wife are co-owners of the shop with a second man, police said.

Vega’s wife was not arrested, nor his was his 19-year-old son, both of whom were with Vega at the time of the raid.

Vega has at least two other children, a 14-year-old son and a 13-year-old girl, police said.

He was booked on a charge of selling methamphetamine and is scheduled to be arraigned in the Long Beach Superior Court on Thursday. His bail was listed at $30,000.

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